The maker of Jiffy baking mixes is spending $35 million in an effort to upgrade and diversify its operations.
Chelsea Milling Company plans to build a new $25 million mixing tower along with a new packaging plant and support facility, the Ann Arbor News reports.
The construction will allow the company to increasingly focus on larger mix packages for its institutional and food service customers.
Although Jiffy is primarily known for the small blue mix boxes on grocery store shelves, Chelsea Milling owner Howdy Holmes said that the company already serves a majority of Michigan prisons, in large part because Jiffy's lack of advertising helps keep prices lower.
"As home baking and eating at home has become less desirable these days, more people want to go out to eat," Holmes told the News. "They're eating in restaurants, in their cars, and as things change we need to reinvent ourselves."
The expansion will increase production from 120 million pounds per month to more than 350 million, while sophisticated new machinery will allow Chelsea to trim its workforce from 315 to about 240.
Holmes said that about half of the current workforce is approaching retirement age and that the company will be able to reduce its positions without implementing layoffs.
